So for those of you with your modern new fangled 50 or 60 year old cars, I'd thought I'd show you how to start a 1917 Model T
Wow, all of that makes you really appreciate starter motors!
Reminds me of a funny story with my old house-mate when we had the '68 Morris Minor, which had a starter motor but also as a back-up system, it still had the starter handle mechanism. So, to find out what all the fuss was about with back-firing and being careful, we decided to start it a few times with the handle. I went first, carefully inserted the crank handle into the bumper hole and then into the crank, turned the ignition on, with a light grip which would enable me to let go quickly if I needed to I whipped it around and it started up and chugged away.
Next, it was my house-mate's turn. He was also concerned with the stories about back-firing, but proceeded to copy my process of using the starting handle. He slowly inserted it into the bumper slot, switched the ignition on, then tried to crank it over but the motion was too slow for the engine to 'catch' and when it made a little noise, he jumped back to safety. He tried again, but this time he was even more tense, he did the same again, but a little quicker, this time the engine started and in the panic of trying to get back to 'safety', he pulled the crank handle out of it's slot to rest it on top of the bumper and tried to use it as leverage to get away from the car, but in the panic, the handle slipped over the bumper and through the radiator!
Water everywhere, we decided it was not worth playing with.
